Conchita Wurst dresses down in suspenders for Karl Lagerfeld in new shoot

Karl Lagerfeld with is subject, Conchita Wurst, in the new issue of CR Fashion Book Photo: Karl Lagerfeld/ CR Fashion Book

You read it here first: Conchita Wurst is the fashion world's newest fascination. A month after closing Jean Paul Gaultier's Haute Couture show the Eurovision song contest winner has teamed up with another white-haired tastemaker: Karl Lagerfeld.

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As well as the creative director of Fendi, Chanel and his eponymous label, Lagerfeld is a dab hand behind the camera, shooting the ad campaigns for the aforementioned brands. So his good friend Carine Roitfeld, editor of CR Fashion Book, called upon Kaiser Lagerfeld to capture the Austrian drag queen in new-season Givenchy for the latest issue of her magazine.

With that artfully groomed beard and gorgeous, glossy mane, there's certainly no mistaking Wurst's identity, who is 25 years old and who in real life goes by the name of Tom Neuwirth.

For the spread, which also features Lagerfeld's affection du jour, pregnant model Ashleigh Good, androgynous model Casey Legler was drafted in to interview the singing sensation.

"I created Conchita as the goal of a very long… well, actually, it's the story of my life" reveals Neuwirth. "I grew up in a small Austrian village, a quite conservative one, and I was the weird little boy always dressing as a girl."

From age 14, Neuwirth would dress up in drag for special occasions, eventually being asked by a friend to host a burlesque show.

"It was overwhelming for me, because besides having fun and dressing up every weekend, I got to learn from such great artists."

But Neuwirth never had the intention to be considered female. "[Being trans] is very serious business, it's a life within itself, so you musn't confuse the two. I always get the question, why the beard? And I think the beard, for me, has so many reasons and so many meanings, but at the end of the day, I want to show that you can achieve anything, that you can have a beautiful life with an kind of look, because the way you look isn't the most important thing in life. It doesn't matter."

Conchita Wurst with top model Ashleigh Good in the new issue of CR Fashion Book